In The Darkness
by Juliet116
Summary: In the middle of the living nightmare that is Raccoon City, a handful of survivors still walk among the undead. With all odds against her, Dani is forced to team up with a pair of strangers to save her life. But what happens when someone else's survival becomes just as important as your own? LeonxOC


The only thing louder than the slamming door and the chorus of footsteps chasing after her was Dani's beating heart, hammering against her ears. She pressed her back against the dark wooden surface that was currently hiding her from her attackers, as if she could keep them out with her own strength and will. But she knew that it was just a matter of time before they found her and when that happened…

She shook her head, not wanting to even think about it now. It would haunt her enough in the future if she managed to escape with her life. She looked at the apartment in front of her, a perfect copy of her own as far as construction went. Dani had been with her parents, only three apartments below in her house, when the first hoard of zombies broke in the building. They had tried to escape through an elevator, but as soon as the doors slid open, both her parents were attacked, leaving Dani to fend for herself.

The thought of her parents being among the crowd of undead that chased her sent chills up and down her spine, even if the chances were slim.

The steps outside seemed to go past her hiding spot and just for a moment, she thought that maybe they wouldn't find her. Then the moment ended with a loud bang on the door that almost sent her tumbling forward. For being dead people, they sure had a lot of strength. Dani looked frantically around the small place, her light gray eyes scanning the room for a hiding spot. The bathroom and closets were out of question, since they would find her and leave her trapped, and as much as she wanted to hide under one of the beds, she knew that would only give her a few extra minutes but not more. Her eyes landed on the window as another hit made the door crack, and Dani ran without hesitation.

She opened the broken window, avoiding the glass shards that threatened to wound her, and poked her head out. She cursed out loud in frustration when she was met with nothing but a freefall. She had really hoped this was one of the few apartments with a ledge under the window, but no such luck. She looked up, seeing that she had missed the ledge by just one floor, the dark bricks just out of her reach.

Another loud crack, followed by a series of lazy moans and deep grunts made Dani swallow hard at what she was about to do.

'Desperate times call for desperate measures, right?' with no one to answer to her thoughts, she sat on the window and swung one of her legs outside, the other one soon joining. She somehow maneuvered her body so that her stomach was pressing down on the wooden frame, only her head and arms still inside. Finally the door gave in and long human –or at least what used to be human- shadows projected themselves inside the living room and on the wall next to her.

Holding her breath in fear, Dani lowered herself until only her fingers were keeping her from falling into a horrible dead; or even worse, into an injury that would allow the zombies to get to her easily.

She bit her lower lip for multiple reasons as slow steps made their way through the apartment that she could no longer see. The brunette could hear how they dragged their feet over the carpet, destroying everything in their search for her. A few seconds went by, in which some zombies passed just close enough to the window for her to see them, and with increasing panic she noticed how tired her arms were; she wasn't going to hold much longer. Dani looked down, trying to see if there were any more zombies nearby, and was met by a surprise both annoying and gratifying. A few floors below her body was a balcony, almost waiting to catch her in case she fell. It was a long shot, considering how small the balcony was, but at this point there weren't many options.

A cold night breeze went by, making her short curly hair fly around madly and the muscles in her left arm to give in. The ring in her middle finger made a scratching sound as her hand slipped, making a small noise, barely hearable even for her. Unfortunately, it was loud enough for the nearest zombie to hear.

Her body dangled from one side to the other, but Dani couldn't care less at the time. She had made a small sound but, somehow, she knew she had been heard. She glanced down, wondering if she could actually make it into that balcony, but snapped her head back up when a hand grabbed her wrist. White, empty eyes met terrified gray ones, and before the hungry creature had a chance to get a better hold of her, instinct took over her entire mind and body.

There is no other way, not even under similar circumstances, that she would have done this without the amount of adrenaline that was pumping through her veins.

Dani held her breath and, closing her eyes as tight as she could, allowed her right hand to slip from the window frame, the fear of being eaten alive, or worse, getting infected, far bigger that whatever fate waited for her down below. Soon, gravity did its work and pulled her down into an empty space that seemed to last forever, much to her dismay.

* * *

"Come on, there's an exit there!" Claire's voice somehow got to Leon over the sound of gunshots, both from him and the redhead. One of the many zombies reaching for him dropped into the ground, a hole now where his eye used to be. The rookie cop took a few steps back, suddenly wondering if they had enough bullets to take out so many of them, and soon reached the conclusion that it was best to retreat.

He grabbed Claire's arm and pulled her in the direction that she had pointed at. They stepped out into an alley filled with puddles and trashcans, and the cold air hit them both like a tons of bricks. Claire slammed the door and pushed it with her shoulder, holding in their pursuers while Leon used a steal pipe to seal the door, if only for a moment.

Claire looked around, and when she saw no immediate threat, she slid down until her butt met the damp floor.

"That was close"

Leon sighed and leaned against the brick wall, not comfortable enough to sit down at the time "Tell me about it"

Almost like a reflection of one another, both Claire and Leon looked at their guns, Unloading and checking their chambers, and counting each bullet carefully. Then they patted their pockets in search for more, Leon being luckier than Claire, but not by much. The latter pushed the magazine into its rightful place and brushed a few stray hair strands out of her face. She would have to redo her ponytail later "I've got twelve left, what about you?"

"Twenty-five" The blonde huffed and looked into the street, not wanting to take any chances "We need to get more somehow. Did you see anything useful before we got inside?"

"I think there was a gun store a few blocks away. Do you think we can make it?"

"It's worth a shot. Come on, let's go" Claire pulled herself up, regretting only for a second not standing up from the wet floor earlier, and followed Leon into the street. A small sign reading 'Ennerdale Street' was the only thing telling the duo where they were. Or at least, it gave them an idea.

"Alright, lead the way" Leon turned both ways and signaled for Claire to go out first, which she did with careful steps. The lack of bullets made them both feel nervous, even if neither would admit it so easily. Leon walked behind her, glancing back in more than one occasion to see if they were being followed. But the street was surprisingly empty, to the point where it became creepy.

Suddenly Claire stopped abruptly, making the taller man bump into her slightly. He looked at her, but her eyes were glued on an apartment building across the street. Leon raised a brow and sent the white, squared structure a look. It was a simple 15 floor building, with dark cement lines every three floors and a couple of balconies here and there, some with potted plants that somehow hadn't been knocked down. But nothing stood out from the place, or at least not to Leon.

"Claire? What is it?"

She raised her hand, motioning for him to be quiet, and kept her eyes on a window on the sixth floor. She could have sworn she just saw someone look out the window, but it had been so fast she wasn't sure. Just when she was about to brush it off, a small but clear movement caught Claire's attention once more. She pointed forward, not taking her eyes off the window in case it disappeared again "Leon, look"

The R.P.D. cop followed both Claire's hand and eyes until he reached a small window. The two watched in curiosity as something that looked a lot like a leg slipped out of the window. But soon curiosity turned into nervousness and horror as a complete body followed, the owner pulling themselves dangerously down.

It was clearly a girl, her figure and clothing giving her away. She was wearing dark colored sneakers that reached her knees, a pair of black skinny jeans that hid under her shoes and a long sleeved shirt –or was it a sweater?- with white and turquoise stripes. She didn't seem to notice the two wide eyed watchers as she dangled from the window, no making any movement to get back inside. Just then Leon noticed something. She hadn't jump.

It was clear that she hadn't slipped or fallen through the window, because they saw her go out, but she was just hanging there, as if waiting for something to happen. But what? A series of movement inside the apartment answered his question. She was hiding.

Claire gasped loudly when one of the girl's hands lost its grip, making her entire body sway from right to left, threatening to make her other hand give in as well. Neither of them had time to think of anything as a hand flew out of the darkness and gripped the girl's arm, making the three of them look up at the zombie that had appeared. Before he could pull her in, she let go, leaving Claire and Leon to watch helplessly as her body landed on a balcony four floors below.

The first one to react was Claire, running through the street before Leon could stop her.

"Claire, wait!"

Claire knew that no matter how much she wanted to, going into the building would be a suicide with the amount of ammo they had, so instead she stood under the balcony, trying to see if the girl was moving. Leon stopped a few steps behind, watching the girls' still figure through the metal bars that stopped her from falling. Or that would have killed her, if she had landed two feet to the right.

"Is she okay?"

Leon hesitated to answer, not a single movement coming from the girl "I don't know. It was quite a fall"

"Hey!" Claire placed her hands around her mouth, making her sound far louder that Leon would have expected "Are you okay?"

Leon reached the redhead and pulled at her arm, making her look at him "They'll hear us" for a moment it looked like Claire was going to ignore Leon, but she remained silent, much to his relief.

A whole minute flew by, and just when Leon was considering trying to climb up, the glass door to the balcony flew open, a zombie stepping forward towards the girl.

* * *

Dani turned her body just in time for her back to take the fall instead of her neck, but it didn't help a lot. The cold cement hit her like a truck would if she jumped into a freeway from a bridge, a sharp pain immediately settling on her ribcage. The loud thump of her collision made it impossible to know if she had broken something, since everything hurt just as badly.

It became hard to get back the air that the fall had taken from her, and the fact that every time she tried her chest would hurt wasn't helping. Dani's eyes closed, her mind in the very edge of unconsciousness, but she knew that if she was out she might wake up to a zombie trying to eat her. And in the state she was, he would most likely succeed.

Her right hand had landed just an inch away from her face, and with just one twitch of her fingers she knew three things. The first was that her nose was bleeding badly, the second that her arm wasn't broken, and third, that it was no exaggeration to say that every part of her body was aching.

Her vision was blurry and she had a terrible headache, but she somehow got the few things next to her to become one solid image instead of a thousand dancing lights. She had been lucky enough to miss both the metal spikes on the edge of the balcony and the potted plant that was just inches away from her head, to which she simply blinked a few times. It really wasn't the time to celebrate any kind of luck.

Her eyes landed on a pair of gardening tools that were, thankfully, at arm's reach from Dani's limp body. She spotted a pair of small, yet sharp garden scissors, completely unnecessary in a place with just one potted plant, but she couldn't have been happier. Fighting with her bare hands didn't sound too appealing.

She started hearing voices somewhere below her, but they quitted down as fast as they had appeared. Were they survivors? They had to be, she didn't think zombies were capable of speaking any longer. She took the moment of silence to test the fingers on her hands and feet, not wanting to risk a huge amount of pain in case something was broken.

Just when some courage built into her to test her strength and stand up, Dani's body froze at the sound of a door opening. The door right next to her, more accurately. To scared to look up, her eyes just had to take a look at the way the person walked to know that it was a zombie and not one of the people she had heard talking. A growl-like sound escaped his throat as he approached her with lazy steps, probably thinking she was dead.

But she wasn't, and something about this made her feel more anger than nervousness or fear. She had just survived a fall that would have killed anyone else, she had run three flights of stairs with a hoard of zombies chasing after her, and now she was just supposed to lay down while an undead person ate her? Dani's brows knitted together as her hand grasped the gardener scissors with new found strength.

No, she was _not_ going to die like this, she simply refused to. Just as the hungry creature leaned forward to attack, she kicked his knee, her fear of having broken bones long gone. the creature –because it felt wrong to call it anything else- fell next to her, and just when it was about to bite her on the face, Dani pushed the scissors into its chest. A sort of howl escaped the zombie before she pulled out the scissors and stuck them in his skull, killing it instantly.

She stared at the corpse for a second. She didn't know if the numbness she felt towards it was a good or bad thing, but she did know that it would take a while for it to settle the right –or wrong- way in her mind. There was just too much in her mind at the moment for it to process.

"Hey!"

Dani looked down and saw two people staring at her. The one that had talked, a girl that looked about the same age as her, had dark red hair held up in a messy ponytail and wore a red vest, a pair of dark shorts and a pair of brown boots. She looked surprised, but not as much as Dani must have looked.

She wanted to answer, but a loud noise behind her cut her off. At least ten zombies were flooding the apartment, all of their white, hungry eyes on the shaking brunette. She closed the glass door, knowing far too well that it wouldn't hold them back at all. Bad time to run out of ideas.

She heard a voice coming from below, and she forced herself to tear her eyes away from the glass door and towards the two strangers. This time it had been the guy who spoke, and seeing that she didn't understand him, he repeated himself "Jump!"

Dani simply stared at him in complete disbelief, but soon understood that he had a fair point. She glanced up, realizing just how great her fall had been a few minutes earlier and then back down at him. He noticed her hesitance and took a step forward, extending his arms "I'll catch you, come on"

Dani simply stared, not really sure if she had the strength to jump over the metal railing without hitting the metallic spikes. She took in his appearance and suddenly felt a little calmer.

He had dark, dirty blond hair, from the horrible night of from his natural color she didn't know, with bangs falling on either side of his face. He was wearing a dark blue uniform, with black boots and a holster with a gun in it across his chest. In his shoulder was the police's insignia, clearly reading 'R.P.D.'. A cop. His hands, both with fingerless gloves, were facing up, still waiting for her to jump down.

The glass behind her shattered and two different voices chorused "Jump!"

Dani placed her hands firmly on the cool metal and, without over thinking it, she jumped down. For a moment she thought she would crash into the ground again, and her eyes closed in expectance. But just when she thought her head would crash into the sidewalk, a pair of strong arms stopped her fall, pulling her closer to someone's chest.

A single gray eye cracked open, meeting a pair of light blue orbs hovering over her.

"Are you okay?" She could hear his voice through his chest, making her cheeks turn the slightest shade of pink.

"Yeah… I'm fine. Thanks for that"

He nodded once "No problem" He set her down, and somehow she managed to stand on her own. Another pair of light eyes landed on her, making Dani feel observed enough for this lifetime.

"You gave us quite a scare there. Are you sure you're okay?"

Dani nodded and smiled, immediately liking her two rescuers. The other girl smiled in return and extended her hand "I'm Claire. Claire Redfield"

"Danielle Crowe. Dani for short" They shook hands, Dani careful enough to use her blood-free hand, as Claire pointed at the guy that had caught her.

"That's Leon"

"An officer I see" Dani pointed out, getting the corner of his mouth to twitch upwards.

"Leon S. Kennedy, first day on the force"

"Quite a first day don't you think?"

"You tell me" That small twitch turned into a full smile, making Dani like this two complete strangers even more. A scraping sound above them made them all turn up, just in time for Leon to pull both girls out of the way before a zombie landed on them. Its body shook a little before it stopped moving, but it was enough to remind them of where they were and what was going on.

"Come on, we should get moving"

"Agreed" Claire muttered before taking the lead, walking down the street with her gun at hand. Leon followed after her, the two of them walking like if an undead hadn't just dropped of the sky. Dani simply watched them, wiping away part of the blood from her face and lips, not really sure if she was supposed to go after them or go her own way. They seemed to be taking care of each other just fine, and maybe she would slow them down…

Leon turned around, giving her a look before speaking "You coming?"

Dani snapped out of whatever took a hold of her and ran to catch up with them not wanting to be left behind.

* * *

**So, first Resident Evil fanfic ever... how did I do? All opinions/comment are welcome. It's always good to know what you think :)**

**Oh, and I just own Dani, nothing else.**


End file.
